


Rock and a Hard Place

by merisunshine36



Series: Sympathy For The Devil [4]
Category: Social Network (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Criminals, Alternate Universe - Mob, Gen, M/M, Non-Canonical Violence, POV Outsider
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-04
Updated: 2011-08-04
Packaged: 2017-10-22 05:33:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/234382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merisunshine36/pseuds/merisunshine36
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Chris teaches Eduardo how to handle a weapon, and in the process, confronts his own demons as well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rock and a Hard Place

Chris shifts his weight around in the creaky leather chair and checks his watch for a third time. The person he's supposed to meet with is now thirteen minutes late. He briefly considers leaving, but that won't get him anywhere. Dustin's had to knock a few more heads together than usual in the past few months, and the only reason the spoils of their labor stay off police radar is because of the careful dance he's engaged in with one Brian Cox, director of Parks and Rec for the city of Boston.

Cox rushes in at 11:18, disheveled and sweaty with the sickly sweet smell of fresh mulch clinging to his expensive suit.

"Jesus Christ, Hughes," Cox covers up his nervousness by going to the minifridge in one corner of his office and grabbing a bottle of water. "You scared me half to death."

"You're late, Cox. Again."

Chris doesn't look up from removing the dirt from beneath his nails with the blade of his Krenshaw. He doesn't like dirt; he'd rather everything be clean and neat. Orderly. Yet Dustin still managed to seduce him away from a perfectly respectable job at a little indie bookstore in Cambridge so that he could help manage the growing number of resentful individuals that Mark Zuckerberg was leaving behind as he made his steady climb to the top of the criminal hierarchy.

"I had to plant trees with some elementary schoolers in one of our new community gardens, okay?" He drops down into a leather swivel chair and cracks his knuckles. "So jump off my dick."

Chris runs his thumb over the brushed steel handle of the knife. Mark insists that he keep a firearm on him at all times, but a switchblade is his weapon of choice. Chris is a lapsed Catholic, and the part of him that still feels guilty about all of this won't allow him to hide behind the impersonal distance that comes with using a gun. For Chris, the feel of someone struggling against you as they bleed out onto the floor is its own kind of penance.

"Don't get your panties in a twist, Cox. I just came to tell you that Mark's been hosting a few events out in Hyde Park lately, so you might need to send out the special cleanup crew."

It's a testament to Chris' powers of persuasion that he was able to get Cox to put a few of Mark's guys on the city payroll. They have one job, and that is to take care of Mark's little messes. It's pretty much a win-win situation anyway, since 2,200 acres of parkland within the city limits requires a lot of mulch. And humans make very good fertilizer.

Cox slams his fist down on the desk. "Tell me you're fucking with me, Hughes. We just pulled someone out of the Charles last week! Do you know what a body looks like after it's been floating down a river for three days?"

Chris keeps a straight face, determined not to give away anything. But he knows exactly who Cox is talking about--that particular one got away from them. Dustin was holding his head under water near one of the small recreational boating docks out in Herter Park when the guy elbowed Dustin in the face and dove in. They had no choice other than to shoot him in the back of the head and let the current drag his body downriver; it wouldn't do if he survived and started talking.

They didn't tell Mark about that. There were some things he just didn't need to know.

"You can't pin that on us, Cox, so don't try. All Mark wants is for us to have a nice working relationship."

"As far as I can see, this relationship isn't working for anyone but you."

The key to negotiating with city officials is to ignore everything they say. It's what they _do_ that matters.

Chris pulls a fat wad of bills secured with a rubberband from his trouser pocket and tosses it onto the desk. It skids across a pile of dog-eared manila folders and comes to a stop next to a snowglobe with a picture of Cox's wife and two little girls inside. How poetic.

"Here. I know the city's dealing with some budget cuts lately. This should help. Or," he pauses for dramatic effect, "you could use it to supplement all those trips to that little full-service massage parlor in Chinatown you like so much."

"What are you talking about?" Cox's nose gives a rabbit-like twitch. It's not as fun messing with him, really--he scares so easily. "I don't go to any massage parlors."

"Really? That's...not what it says on your credit card statement," he responds, all innocent confusion. Chris closes his switchblade with a flick of his wrist, then smooths the lapels of his suit and gets to his feet. The leather upholstery was beginning to make the back of his thighs sweat, and that's not attractive at all. "I've got a reporter at the Globe on standby to run a story about your six-month affair with one of the staff there the minute I say "go". I know you're thinking about a run for mayor next year, Cox. Is this really the time to test the public's loyalty?"

Cox turns a bright tomato red, like he's being choked. The water bottle leaks over his fingers as he reflexively crumples the soft plastic in his fist.

"Fuck you, Hughes. And fuck Zuckerberg, too. This is gonna come back and bite you in the ass one day. You can't keep pulling these kind of stunts and expect to get away with it!"

"I can't?" Chris injects a note of false astonishment into his voice. "Because from where I'm standing, it looks like I just did."

Chris grins to himself as he shuts the door to Cox's office behind him. Damn, it feels good to be a gangster.

..:::..

Chris has one eye on the sandwich he's making and the other on a rebroadcast of the day's Wimbledon matches when Mark shows up in their overlarge kitchen and occupies the stool next to his. He's hunched over and doing his damnedest to chew through his bottom lip. Chris immediately shuts off the television to give Mark his full attention, a little sad that he won't get to watch Rafael Nadal pound his opponent into the court with those gorgeous arms of his.

As per usual, Mark has abandoned the suit they stuff him into every morning in favor of shorts and a faded t-shirt. It's one of the many things about Mark that makes Chris think that this is, and always will be, a game to him. The suit is just an unfortunate requirement of the public persona he's forced to display. Mark doesn't do any of this--the extortion, the bribery, the embezzlement-- for the money or the prestige. He does it because he likes it, because it scratches an itch inside him that will never quite go away.

"He won't take it," Mark says, the tension pouring off of him in waves.

Dustin gets information out of Mark by talking his ear off. He'll push Mark right up to that edge of violence where Mark will either offer up an emotionally stunted confession born from pure frustration or slam a door in his face. Chris would rather just be patient. Given time, everyone tips their hand eventually.

He spoons a dollop of mayo on top of his tomato slices with a little extra flourish and finishes it off with a hit of oregano. Somehow their enormous stainless steel refrigerator stays filled all the time. He suspects Eduardo has something to do with it, but as it's not something in Chris' job description, he doesn't ask. He works his mouth around the small mountain of turkey and lettuce while waiting for Mark to give up the details of his latest personal crisis.

Mark reaches into his waistband and produces a shiny new gun that he places next to Chris' plate. Chris raises an eyebrow in question, Mark nods in response. He wipes his hands off carefully before picking it up and testing its weight in his hand, looking down the gunsight. It's a Sig Sauer .45 auto, a compact with clean lines and no frills. It looks like the kind of thing Mark would buy.

"It's a nice piece. Who's it for?"

"I bought it for Wardo." He takes the other half of Chris' sandwich and begins picking off the lettuce, dropping it in a soggy little pile on the counter. Chris twitches, and after a few seconds he gives in and scoops the sodden mess back onto his plate. "I bought it for him, and he gave it back."

Oh, shit. Chris should have seen this one coming.

Christopher E. Hughes would like to state for the record that he knew Eduardo was trouble from the moment he first laid eyes on him. Eduardo is messy and emotional, and he doesn't know when to throw in the towel when it comes to fighting with Mark (answer: immediately). What's worse is that Mark is stupidly in love with him, so he lets Eduardo run his mouth until he's really pissed off. They fight constantly, and when they're not fighting, they're having obnoxiously loud makeup sex. But at least that's better than the alternative, which often involves ice picks, hammers, and other tools never meant to come into contact with human flesh. And more collateral damage always means more work for Chris, who has not been on vacation in three years.

"Did you ask him if he wanted it, or did you force it on him?" Chris tries to channel the conciliatory tones used by relationship counselors on those bad mid-morning talk shows so as not to trip any of Mark's wires.

"Wardo's safety is not an option. He's a weakness right now, a target. I can't waste my time waiting for him to get capped by some kid who's carrying a grudge because I burned his father's corner store down."

Telling Mark that he's right will only mean that Eduardo will come bitch at him later. He doesn't know how to diffuse this situation--Mark's feelings are Dustin's area of expertise. Chris is solely the business end of things, there to pave the way past unexpected difficulties that come in the shape of elected officials, nosy reporters, and corporate interests who have this misguided notion that organized crime is bad for business. He does his job well, because when Mark is happy, everyone is happy.

Looks like it's time for Diversion Tactic #1.

"What did Dustin say?" Chris asks.

Mark waves his hand dismissively. "Dustin is running an errand."

Well, fuck. What did Chris ever do to deserve this? He pushes his plate toward Mark, appetite destroyed for good.

"So what do you want me to do about it?" he asks, watching Mark lick mayonnaise from his fingers.

"Make him take it. Teach him how to use it." His eyes are as cold and blank as the gun itself as he deposits it in Chris' palm. "If Eduardo gets hurt, it's your fault."

It's so sweet, the way Mark cares about people.

..::...

"Shit, Dustin, watch his head!" admonishes Chris. They're currently loading an unconscious Eduardo Saverin into the back hatch of an SUV, a task that is proving harder than they first thought. Dustin is used to loading dead bodies into vehicles, but this one is precious goods.

"I'm trying! For someone so skinny, he weighs a ton," grunts Dustin. He folds Eduardo's long limbs carefully, remembering at the last moment to tuck the pillow Chris brought along beneath his head. With a sigh of relief, Dustin crawls over his inert form and scrambles back out.

Chris shuts the hatch carefully and breathes a sigh of relief. "Thanks, man. I owe you."

"I'm still not sure why agreed to this, because if Mark finds out that you put sleeping pills in Eduardo's coffee, you can count on losing at least one major appendage, if not two."

"It was the only thing I could think of!" Chris yanks the passenger door open and ducks inside. "Do you really think that if Mark can't get him to do something, that I can?"

"Isn't that your job?" Dustin prods. "Getting people to do things they don't want to?"

He pulls smoothly out of the driveway and into the street. At half-past five, everything is deadly silent save for the occasional passing vehicle. Luckily for Chris, Eduardo is a freakish early riser and Mark prefers to sleep in until past noon unless absolutely necessary, doing most of the work of running his empire at night. Chris has around seven hours to convince Eduardo that learning his way around a gun is a good idea.

"This is different," Chris bites out.

"I'm just asking, because if you're looking to get into the enforcer side of things, I don't want to have to find a new job."

Chris wishes Dustin was like a normal person at five a.m., bleary-eyed and sleep-deprived. But he's so used to being hauled off to work at all times of day and night that the minute you wake him up, he's ready for action.

"Shut up and drive, Dustin."

..:::..

The trip up to Moon Island from the city is thankfully uneventful. They lower Eduardo's still-inert form into a small boat and speed across the water, sticking close to the pylons so that no one can see them. The island serves as a training ground for Boston PD and is officially off limits to the public, but it houses the best firing range for miles around. Swamp terrain, forest terrain, indoor facilities--you name it, they got it. There's a narrow, two-lane causeway leading to the island itself (Dustin has pointed out that it would be _much_ more convenient to just drive over on more than one occasion), but Chris prefers the water route, since there are more options for escape should the need arise.

They cut the motor a few hundred yards offshore and row the rest of the way in. The water is rough, and Eduardo groans a little in his chemically-induced sleep. Chris doesn't feel too hot himself--he's from deep in North Carolina; open water is not his forte.

Once on land, Chris hoists Eduardo onto his shoulders into a fireman's carry. He'll take cover beneath some of the scrubby trees dotting the landscape until Eduardo wakes up. Dustin will head back to the house to serve as their point man in case Mark wakes up.

"This is it," Chris says, unexpectedly nervous.

Dustin gives Chris an encouraging punch in the arm, and Chris nearly drops Eduardo. Chris swears, but grits his teeth and manages to stay upright.

"Sorry, sorry! I'll leave now, okay. Do your thing, Mr. Miyagi." He winks and scrambles back down the shore toward the dock.

Chris doesn't stay to watch him leave. Dustin can take care of himself; he's got the scars to prove it. He unloads Eduardo at the base of a squat tree whose trunk is barely wide enough to hide him from view. A squirrel scrambles down and fusses at them for interrupting his breakfast before disappearing into the canopy once again. Chris slips back out from the line of trees and makes his way stealthily to the guard post, where he taps on the window.

The officer on duty is a wiry fellow named David DiFeliciantonio, a youngish cop who never quite recovered from his teenage bout with acne. He's discontented with his post out on the island, something that Chris was happy to take advantage of. In exchange for a few hundred bucks a week he sends Chris the guard rotation for the island, so they only come during times that are friendly.

Chris has gotten to know David a little too well over the past year. He knows that David loves bad jokes and good red wine, that his parents were murdered during a burglary when he was six, that he was raised by his _nonno_ who is in the hospital waiting for a new kidney. The part of this job that Chris loves is also what makes him hate it--if you want to get under other people's skin, sometimes you have to let them get under yours.

"Mr. Hughes," David shakes his hand firmly, his trained investigator's eyes taking in Chris' slightly rumpled suit and the dirt beneath his fingers. "Hard at work this early in the morning, are we?"

Chris smiles and shrugs. "How's your grandfather?" he replies, skirting the question.

"Not too good." The light in his eyes fades a little. "He's been on dialysis for three months already; I don't know how much longer he's gonna hold out."

"Oh." Chris is surprised to find that this information unsettles him. It shouldn't--the sun rises, the sun sets, and old people die. It's the way things work.

"Yeah, it sucks," David says, a wry twist to his mouth. "So what's it gonna be today, boss? The indoor range?"

"Nah, we'll be outside today, so I'll need you to manage the video feed."

"You got it--who's here with you?"

David asks too many questions; that's his one weak point. If he doesn't learn to shut his mouth he'll have to be disposed of, even if it means going through the trouble of finding a new in. Besides, David's a good kid. It would be a shame if he died.

"A personal friend of Mr. Zuckerberg's." Chris fishes into his pocket and pulls out a couple fifties he brought along to sweeten the pot. He tucks it into David's breast pocket, right behind his badge, and winks. "Mr. Zuckerberg and I are very appreciative of your assistance. We don't forget our friends."

David ducks his head a little and smiles, his dimples making him look even younger than he already is. Chris is hard-pressed to keep his defensive walls up so as to keep from being charmed.

He takes his time getting back to Eduardo, seizing on this tiny bit of downtime to clear his head. He fingers the battered old copy of Camus' _L'Etranger_ in the original French that he likes to carry around in his back pocket. Chris read it for the first time in his freshman year literature class at Harvard, and as an eighteen year old still at the mercy of his hormones more often than not, he was drawn in by the protagonist's coolly dispassionate attitude towards violence. Eduardo should be out a little while longer; maybe he'll get some reading in before he wakes up.

Unfortunately for Chris, by the time he returns to the place where Eduardo should be, he's already disappeared.

*

Maintaining a firm grip on his sense of calm, he carefully retraces the steps he took to get here, heart hammering in his chest all the while. The peaceful silence of early morning is already being broken up by the early morning chatter of the birds up in the trees.

"Fuckin' A," Chris yells, before he remembers that he supposed to be on the down low out here.

Where the heck could he have gotten to so fast? The meds weren't supposed to wear off quite yet, which hints at something ominous that Chris doesn't want to think about--that someone found him out here and hauled him off to be interrogated.

There's an answering rustle from behind him, and Chris hand goes for his knife before he has time to think about it.

"Chris?" He turns to see Eduardo peeking out from behind a tree a few yards away. How stupid is it that he didn't notice him there?

"Oh god, Wardo." Chris' knees nearly buckle in sheer relief. "You skinny fucker, I couldn't even see you back there."

Eduardo picks his way through the underbrush until he gets to where Chris is. He still looks half-asleep but is tense all over, and he keeps looking over his shoulder like he expects someone to leap out from beneath a bush and haul him off. Which Chris kind of just did, so he supposes that's justifiable.

"Where do you think we are?" he asks, keeping his voice low.

Chris plucks a stray leaf from Eduardo's hair. "I'm sure you'd like to know the answer to that question, but for now all you need to know is that I brought you here." He's not going to beat around the bush. If Eduardo wants to try and take him out, they might as well get it over with. Unless he's got some tricks up his sleeve that Chris doesn't know about, he's not going to get very far without a weapon anyway.

"You _what_?"

"I brought you here. Well, Dustin and I did. We put a little something extra in your coffee and threw you into the back of the car, then brought you here for some quality time. Dearest Eduardo, today is the day you learn how to handle a gun."

"No." He puts his hands up in the air, defensive. "This is not happening. Mark and I already went through this once."

Chris just turns his back on his red-faced companion and sets off toward the squat brick building that houses the firing range. After a few moments of impotent fuming on Eduardo's part, he hears the telltale crunching of leaves and twigs that means he's decided to follow along after all.

*

"Chris, you're just wasting your time," Eduardo protests.

"I think I'll be the judge of that," says Chris, surreptitiously peeking in the window of the little reception area to make sure it was empty before leading him around the back. There's no reason there should be anyone here at this time of morning, but it never hurts to check.

Eduardo grabs Chris by the elbow and yanks him around so that they're facing each other. His nostrils flare with each angry exhale. "I'm not going to go around the city carrying a gun; I don't care what Mark says."

Chris carefully extracts himself from Eduardo's grip. "Mmhmm."

He uses the key David gave him to open the outdoor equipment shed; a small, windowless building made from a few concrete blocks slapped together with a tin roof tacked on top. Unless you know what you're looking for, it's hard to find anything amidst old targets riddled with bullet holes and new ones that have yet to meet their fate, boxes and boxes of shells in every size imaginable, and the odd poster of a hot girl in a bikini. Chris is familiar enough with the space that he doesn't bother turning the light on, and just grabs a couple pairs of headsets and shooting glasses from a row of hooks along the wall closest to him.

"Are you even listening to me?" Eduardo asks.

"If I said yes, I'd be lying."

It takes a moment for his eyes to adjust to the abrupt change in light levels once emerges from the little cave. Chris holds a hand up to his eyes and squints into the sun; nothing much at all has changed since the last time he was here. The neatly trimmed lawn stretches out before them, a flat expanse of grass and weeds kept in check only due to near-religious mowing courtesy of the parks department. It runs right up to a series of targets set at various distances, the furthest of which are nearly indistinguishable from the bank of pine trees behind them.

A breeze kicks up, carrying the salt and moisture off the water inland. Chris hopes it doesn't throw things off too much for them. He comes to a halt at the stall dead in the center and settles his headset around his neck, then turns to Eduardo with a sigh.

"Please, Eduardo. I really just...I need you to work with me this time, okay?"

"What for? I keep out of everything Mark does, _everything_ , so I don't have to worry about shit like this. And if there was something going on, he would tell me." He buries his hands deeper into his pockets. "I stay out of this part. It has nothing to do with me."

 _Interesting_. Chris assumed that Eduardo's dislike of guns was purely out of fear, but now he's beginning to suspect that it's more a case of his weird sense of morals and stupid tendency to stick his head in the sand when things aren't going his way.

The usual slate of thinly-veiled threats Chris employs on a regular basis aren't going to work here. They rolled off Eduardo's back even before before he was boning the most dangerous man in the city, and the only people who would try something now have a really serious death wish. Not that this deters Chris, who knows that Eduardo's true weakness is that he's a total soft touch.

Chris calls up the kind of expression he first used when trying to get the vice-provost at Harvard to cough up some extra financial support for a tutoring program he volunteered for. Shoulders squared, jaw clenched with equal parts anxiety and determination, and just a touch more emotional _oomph_ than was par for the course.

"Mark would do anything for you, you know that. But right now, you're a liability." He crosses his arms over his chest. "You know that things are heating up between Mark and the Winklevii. All it takes is one bullet with your name on it when you're leaving that job you insist on keeping and you're bleeding out in the middle of the street. Now take a moment to consider about how Mark would react if you turned up with a hole in the back of your head. If you honestly believe the guilty parties would be the only ones to pay the price, then you're a bigger idiot than I thought."

"That's ridiculous," Eduardo mumbles. Chris seizes on the fact that he's hit a nerve and pushes forward. "He only asked because he cares about you. We just want you to be safe."

He's not surprised when Eduardo huffs out a short breath of air and crosses the space between them. He holds his palm upward, expectant.

"Give it to me."

Chris snorts. "Let's not get ahead of ourselves, boy wonder. First things first. Assume that anyone with a gun in their hand is going to kill you. Don't trust anyone, ever."

"Not even Mark?"

" _Especially_ not Mark."

He shifts slightly so Eduardo can see what he's doing. "Check the magazine first, make sure you have a round chambered. The last thing you want is to be stuck trying to rack the slide when some asshole is coming at you." Chris points the gun toward the ground, then hands it over to Eduardo, who hesitates for a fraction of a second before taking it in hand.

"Finger off the trigger, unless you're ready to kill someone," Chris warns.

Eduardo chews at his bottom lip and nods. There's a thin line of sweat across his upper lip, and not for the first time, Chris wonders about the wisdom of this decision. Chris grew up in a part of the country where people kept guns as a matter of course, but all the same, he knew a fare share of people who took unexpected vacations to the emergency room because they got jittery around a firearm and forgot to keep it pointed away from anything that wasn't a target.

Calmly, Chris guides his hands so they're cradling the butt of the pistol grip, textbook perfect. They're close enough that he can smell the faint flowery scent of whatever product Eduardo loads his hair down with every morning. Eduardo's pulse flutters erratically beneath the skin of his wrist so Chris gives him a moment to calm down before they go on, to let his breathing and his heart rate settle a little.

"The safety mechanism on this particular model requires that you put a little extra pressure on the trigger to get off that first round. So before you take your finger off the guard, I want you to make sure you're ready to commit to this. When you're in a gunfight, the other guy isn't gonna stop and let you think while you have an ethical crisis. Your morals won't do you much good if you're dead."

The corner of Eduardo's mouth tilts upward a little. "Yeah, I get it. Stop talking and tell me what to do next."

Chris smiles, glad to see that Eduardo is back to being his usual tetchy self. He lifts Eduardo's arms a little higher so that the gunsights are right in his line of vision, then gives him one last reassuring squeeze on the shoulder before stepping back and away.

"Don't let your arms fall--can you see the target right on top of the sights?"

"I...I think so. It's blurry though, I can't really make it out."

"That means you're good," Chris rocks back and forth on the balls of his feet, anxious. "So whenever you're ready, it's your show. Try not to anticipate the recoil, just relax and press the trigger."

Everything is silent saved for the muffled horns of the boats off in the harbor and the harsh sound of Eduardo's breathing, like the whole world is holding its breath.

"Relax, relax, relax," Eduardo whispers to himself. He exhales one final time, slides his finger past the trigger guard, and pulls. The resulting noise is loud enough to scare off the few woodland creatures stupid enough to still be hanging around; a cloud of tiny birds disperse into the air and fly in distracted circles.

Once Eduardo returns the gun to the ledge in front of him, Chris slings an arm around his neck and gives him a congratulatory slug in the arm that's hard enough to make him wince. He pulls the headset from his head and yells into Eduardo's ear.

"Tell me how you feel!"

Eduardo blinks slowly a few times, then looks down at his hands. "Chris, I just shot a fucking gun! I could have killed somebody!"

Chris nods eagerly. "I know! Pretty fucking awesome, right?"

"I mean, I guess. Kind of? Maybe? Now what?"

"Now," says Chris, doing his level best to keep a straight face, "we do it again, and again, and again. And maybe by the end of the day...you'll actually hit the target."

"I didn't hit anything?" Eduardo looks shocked. He turns to squint at his target, whereupon his shoulders slump a little. "But I did exactly what you said."

"Don't let it get to you," Chris replies, nonchalant. "You can't expect to be perfect the first time."

"I don't," he insists. The way Eduardo is glaring at his Sig makes Chris less inclined to believe him.

Chris decides to give Eduardo a few minutes to finish pouting over the fact that he's not perfect, which is the only reason he hears the soft _snick_ of the door to the indoor facility shutting behind him. He goes stone still, and raises a finger to his lips so that Eduardo keeps his mouth shut.

"I think we have some unexpected guests," Chris breathes. He pushes Eduardo far enough into the stall so that he's hidden from view. "Stay here. Do not leave this spot, or I'll take you out myself. I'm going inside to take a look around, if I don't come back in five minutes--"

"Come after you?"

"No," Chris says, shaking his head. The last thing he needs is a newly-deflowered Eduardo trying to be a hero. "Call Chang and tell him to get his ass down here as fast as he can."

"Are you sure I can't help?"

Chris puts his hand in his back pocket and pulls out his old copy of _L'Etranger_. "Here, hold this for me. If things get messy, I don't want any blood on it."

..:::..

Chris makes himself forget about Eduardo so he can focus on what's ahead. He shakes the tension from his shoulders and pulls out his knife, keeping it close to his thigh. If it's who he thinks it is, then appearing unarmed is should work to his advantage.

He doesn't see anything of note until he gets to the reception area he checked out earlier. David is standing at the reception desk with his back to Chris, head bent so that he can cradle his cell phone beneath his ear. He fingers the grip on his pistol absentmindedly as he talks.

"Yeah, it's Hughes, I swear. He's here with some other guy." A pause. "No, he didn't say how long he'd be here, but they just got started so you got a little while at least. Yeah. Okay. Bye."

Chris is suddenly so angry he can't see straight. He trusted this kid, he trusted him with that fucking sob story about his grandfather and his parents, even when he knew shouldn't. He had a plan to try and negotiate some kind of deal that wouldn't involve anyone getting hurt, but all that just went out the window.

He catches David off guard in time to grab his right arm and force it up between his shoulderblades until he there's a dull _pop_ indicating that his shoulder has come out of its socket. David howls out in a mixture of pain and surprise, and Chris takes advantage of his temporary distraction to gain control of his other arm and pin him down. The cell phone gets knocked off the desk in the scuffle and clatters to the floor, forgotten.

"Who were you talking to, David?" Chris yanks the gun from David's holster and tosses it onto the ground.

"No one, my girlfriend, no one," he whimpers, his brown eyes large and terrified.

"You don't have a girlfriend, David," Chris hisses in his ear. "I know, I checked."

Chris fishes the knife out of his pocket again and flips the blade open, then flashes it in front of David's eyes. Long experience has taught Chris that the threat of pain is almost as good as doing the deed itself.

"How many fingers can you afford to lose, David? How many? Two? Three, maybe?"

"Please don't, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he babbles, his face a mess of snot and tears as he struggles to get away, jerking about like a landed fish. It doesn't get him anywhere because his other arm is still of commission, twisted at a grotesque angle.

Chris closes his eyes and tries to bring himself back from the edge, letting the knife fall to his side. If the kid has a panic attack, he won't be good for anything. Chris lowers his voice, makes it soft and gentle.

"I know you're sorry. Just tell me who you were talking to, and I'll let you go home."

"It was Cox," David's voice ratchets up a few panicky octaves. "He knows you come here sometimes, so he asked me to call if I saw anything. Mayor Winklevoss has been riding him hard about Zuckerberg all week, I had to."

 _Of course_ , Chris thinks, recalling the threat that Cox issued the last time they were together. And it makes sense that it would all come together here, since Moon Island is Cox's territory. Chris hadn't made much of their little discussion at the time. If he kept track of every time someone threatened him, he'd go crazy. But the fact that he was off his game enough to miscalculate Cox's true intent is disturbing; he can't help but wonder what other things he might have missed.

"Why would you do a stupid thing like that, David?" He pushes his hips forward, bears down on the back of David's neck enough to make him choke and gasp. "I thought we had an agreement. Are you telling me that I don't treat you well?"

David's eyes dart wildly back and forth. "He said he'd help out my _nonno_ , okay? Cox said that he could get him bumped to the top of the kidney transplant list if I did him a favor." Chris can feel the moment when all of the fight drains out of David, and he just lies still beneath him, sniffling. "I just don't want him to die."

Listening to him is like a punch to the gut. All the depersonalization techniques Chris has drilled into himself over the years are pretty much useless, now. Chris grits his teeth and tightens his grip on the knife handle. David isn't a friend, he's just a broken cog in a machine that has to keep running whether he's there or not.

"Here's your fucking kidney," Chris growls, and drives the blade into David's side with a grunt. It goes in clean and smooth with no resistance at all, and Chris feels his stomach clench and his heart rate pick up a little in response. It becomes harder to maintain a good grip on the knife handle as David's blood oozes between Chris' fingers, warm and sticky.

Once, when he was drunk out of his mind, Chris confided in Dustin that every time he killed someone, it was a little like falling in love.

He lowers his mouth to the pink shell of David's ear, and whispers that he's sorry.

..::..

Chris cleans up the mess to the best of his ability (which is admittedly not that great), and by the time Eduardo shows up he's folding his knife again, tucking it away safely into his pocket. Chris glances at the clock, surprised to find that only seven minutes have passed since he first set foot in the building--it felt like an eternity.

To his credit, Eduardo doesn't say anything when he catches sight of the body, although he does go a little pale beneath that ever present tan of his. He must have guessed something like this was about to go down. Eduardo may be annoying, but he's also smart--Mark wouldn't keep him around otherwise.

"You want your book back?" he asks. Chris is amused; Eduardo is going for the safe question first, instead of why he did it or how he's feeling.

"Just hold onto it for a second. You call Chang?" Chris spits into his palm and begins rubbing at the congealing blood on his hands with the corner of his shirt, which is pretty much ruined anyway. He must look a mess. "I don't have any blood on my face, do I?"

Eduardo looks at him warily, and takes an unconscious step backward. "Your face is fine," he says. "Chang wasn't around, so I just called Dustin instead."

"Fine," Chris mutters. He's not entirely sure that he's in mood to see Dustin, who will try and tell him that he did the right thing, that David deserved it. He stares down at the body. David died with his eyes open, but the first thing Chris did was shut them. He doesn't like it when they look at him.

"Are you okay?" Eduardo asks. He lays a hand between Chris' shoulder blades, right near where his heart is. Eduardo's brand of effortless affection is more comforting than Chris wants it to be; in the course of a few short minutes, the tables have been completely turned.

"He was just a kid," Chris says, mostly to himself. He's already in the process of bottling up anything he might have been feeling a few minutes ago, sealing it all away so that all that's left are a few faint traces of regret. He knows that this isn't normal, but he hasn't been normal for a long time.

Chris thinks about all the extra work that this little incident will create, and shakes his head. "This is gonna be such a fucking mess. If taking David out of the picture isn't enough to shut Cox up, then we'll have to go after him, too."

Eduardo doesn't say anything, just stares at him with an expression that manages to be concerned and disappointed all at once. He sighs and gives Chris' shoulder an extra squeeze. A car door slams somewhere close by, and a few seconds later Dustin is calling for them as he makes his way inside.

"Over here!" Eduardo yells.

Chris shrugs out from beneath Eduardo's touch, and offers a small smile. "You see, Wardo? It's just like it says on all those NRA bumper stickers. Guns don't kill people--people do."

 

..:::..

Chris stumbles blearily down the stairs at half past too-early in the morning the following Tuesday. There's a city council meeting at eight a.m.; he needs to be there to glad hand a few folks and find out who that contractor is that's working on that science complex Harvard is building out in Allston in case they need a new dump site. If he has time and the inclination, he might even make a stop over at Mass General and have a few words with the endocrinologist on duty about the patient on the third floor, room 309A.

There's really only enough time to make this a coffee-and-go kind of morning, but now he's craving an omelet. Chris used to love cooking before his early years with Mark and Dustin robbed him of that habit. There wasn't much point in spending three hours putting an extravagant dinner together only to have to jump up and leave the table whenever there was business to be handled.

He's trying to decide between spinach and feta or ham with bell peppers when he's brought up short by the sounds of conversation drifting toward him from the kitchen.

"A holster, Mark? Really?" Eduardo's voice reaches his ears loud and clear. He sounds equal parts bewildered and incredulous. "You want me to wear it while we have _sex_?"

"Consider this a compromise," Mark replies, the cadence measured and even. "What I really want to do is fuck you with the gun."

Eduardo makes a choked sound of surprise, then, "I could maybe...I mean, it's a really, really dumb idea but, um..."

Chris doesn't catch the end of that conversation because he's busy beating a hasty retreat back up the stairs. He didn't really want breakfast, anyway.

Mark hired Chris to gather information on people. Their likes, their dislikes, how many kids they have, the name of the beloved family dog that was run over the first time little Suzie got behind the wheel. What each of their buttons are and the best way to push them until Mark gets what he wants.

But there are some things that Chris doesn't ever need to know.


End file.
